Friday, 29 March 2024 »  Login
in

Princess Durru Shehwar passes away

And for all those who believe Hyderabad is really south of the Musi and the rest is all bunkum, here's the capital of fullhyd.com!

Moderator: The Moderator Team

Princess Durru Shehwar passes away

by Howlay Mian » Mon Feb 13, 2006 9:57 pm

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/main.jh ... ortal.html



Princess Dürrühsehvar of Berar

(Filed: 11/02/2006)



Her Imperial Highness Princess Dürrühsehvar, Princess of Berar, who died in London on Tuesday night aged 92, was a member of the Turkish royal house; after her family had been sent into exile, she married an Indian prince.



Although statuesque and grand, she was also shy, sensitive and cultured. Letters from her arrived in perfect calligraphy. She shunned publicity, and will probably be best remembered for her striking image in profile taken by Cecil Beaton on his wartime visit to Bombay in March 1944. The picture captures a handsome and autocratic-looking lady wearing a white sari, serene on the terrace of her palace, and was in stark contrast to the normal images of war that were emerging from elsewhere in India.



Beaton was impressed by her "sensational" looks, the "climate of restfulness and serenity" she created about her, as well as by her love for philosophy and literature, her proficiency in many languages and the "Ottoman perfection of her taste".



He also photographed the Princess when she was in London for the 1937 Coronation, and she happened to be in New York in 1948 at the time of his affair with Garbo - Beaton and Garbo referred to her as "our Turkish friend". In the summer of 1949 he reported to Garbo that he had lunched with the Princess at her London home, Hyderabad House on Palace Green: "It was like being in Hyderabad again, with a wonderful Indian meal lasting much too long & everything so delayed that the afternoon was almost over before we'd finished the Turkish coffee. The Princess, in European clothes was very shy & giggly but very charming & interesting when given time & the chance."



The Princess was born at Tchamlidcha-Scutari on March 12 1913 (or possibly 1914 - the reference books are not clear), the only daughter of Abdülmecid II and his third wife, Mihisti. Her father was Caliph of the Faithful, with the additional titles of Successor of the Prophet Mohammed, Commander of the Faithful and The Shadow of God on Earth. A cultured man who spoke Turkish, Arabic, French and German, he composed music and was a highly proficient painter, producing landscapes and scenes from Ottoman history (which his daughter went to great lengths to buy when they came up at auctions).



He succeeded as Caliph in 1922, and the family resided in the Dolmabahçe Palace on the European shore of Istanbul.



In 1924 the Palace was surrounded by troops, and Adnan Adivar, adviser to Ataturk, warned the Caliph that he was to be deposed by the National Assembly and that he and his family must go. The family began their exile in Paris and Nice.



During this time they were supported by Asaf Jah VII, Nizam of Hyderabad, one of the richest men in the world, who dressed shabbily but made many charitable benefactions. He gave the Caliph a stipend of £4,000 a year.



The Caliph led life "apart from the worldly vanities", as he put it, and was often observed on the beach in Nice wearing bathing trunks and holding a parasol. During this time Reza Shah Pahlavi (the Shah of Persia), King Fuad I of Egypt and the Nizam of Hyderabad vied with each other to secure the princess as bride for their respective heirs. The Nizam won. It was in Nice that the princess married, on November 12 1931, Hymayat Ali Khan Azam Jah, Prince of Berar, son and heir of the Nizam. At the same ceremony her cousin Princess Nilüfer married another son of the Nizam.



There was none of the normal oriental splendour characteristic of such occasions; rather it was a simple ceremony of Islam, attended by members of the two families and friends. The Caliph presided over both weddings.



The two couples travelled to Hyderabad, where the Nizam broke protocol to greet them.



There was wild applause and shouts of blessing as the royal party made its way to the Palace. Both couples settled in the lakeside palace of Bella Vista, and attended state banquets of welcome, the guests eating off gold plates.



The Princess of Berar soon adopted Indian ways. She spoke Urdu like a native and had fluent English. But she was modern in her approach, believing that women should earn their own livings, and she helped to remove the habit of purdah in Hyderabad. She and the Prince had two sons, Prince Mukarram Jah (who married five times and lived variously in Australia and Turkey) and Prince Mukhaffham Jah, the present de jure Nizam.



During her time in Hyderabad, the Princess made a considerable impression. Philip Mason, of the Indian Civil Service, described her as "a commanding figure, handsome of feature, with a clear fair complexion and auburn hair… No one could ignore her or slight her. She was always essentially and indefinably royal, and it seems to me that if fate had so willed she might have been one of the great queens of the world."



When Walter Monckton arrived in Hyderabad in 1946 to try to disillusion the Nizam of the idea that Hyderabad could remain independent, he judged the princess "a woman tranquil yet resolute, whose personality dominated any room she entered". The Prince and Princess of Berar were also well known internationally. In 1937 they were amongst the relatives of ruling princes who attended the Coronation of King George VI and Queen Elizabeth, and were seated in the North Choir Gallery of Westminster Abbey.



The Nizam died in 1967 and was succeeded by his grandson. The Prince of Berar died in 1970. For many years the Princess lived at Hyderabad House in Kensington Palace Gardens, later moving to an apartment where all the old-fashioned royal standards were maintained. It was noted that, even if she arrived in the country in a less than grand car, the driver still wore the livery of Hyderabad, with knee-boots.



In the 1990s she opened a hospital she had established at Purani Haveli in India. The crowds were keener to see her than the Chief Minister of Andhura Pradesh, NT Rama Rao, himself a film star.



There was an occasion when she was lunching with a friend in Oxfordshire, at which Princess Margaret was also a guest. The weather was inclement, and both Princesses were invited to plant cedars of Lebanon. Princess Margaret eventually did so - reluctantly - while the Princess of Berar performed her duty with her customary quiet dignity.
Howlay Mian
Registered User
 
Posts: 4
Joined: Sun Jan 22, 2006 3:43 am

Return to Dakhni-Mehfil - The Old World Hyderabad

Who is online

Users browsing this forum: No registered users and 7 guests

cron
ADVERTISEMENT
SHOUTBOX!
{{todo.name}}
{{todo.date}}
[
]
{{ todo.summary }}... expand »
{{ todo.text }} « collapse
First  |  Prev  |   1   2  3  {{current_page-1}}  {{current_page}}  {{current_page+1}}  {{last_page-2}}  {{last_page-1}}  {{last_page}}   |  Next  |  Last
{{todos[0].name}}

{{todos[0].text}}

ADVERTISEMENT
This page was tagged for
images+of+durru+mia+daughter+wedding
Follow fullhyd.com on
Copyright © 2023 LRR Technologies (Hyderabad) Pvt Ltd. All rights reserved. fullhyd and fullhyderabad are registered trademarks of LRR Technologies (Hyderabad) Pvt Ltd. The textual, graphic, audio and audiovisual material in this site is protected by copyright law. You may not copy, distribute or use this material except as necessary for your personal, non-commercial use. Any trademarks are the properties of their respective owners.